KI-Media2 KI Media Released documents by Anonymous could bring diplomatic embarrassment to Cambodia?

12 September 2012
KI-Media

Yesterday, Hacktivist group Anonymous released thousands of sensitive Cambodian government documents in retaliation after the co-founder of The Pirate Bay was arrested. Following the release of these documents, we browsed one set of documents released and what we found out could be quite embarrassing for Cambodia.

Among documents found in the package posted on , we noted that, unlike Anonymous’ claim that they belong to the Cambodian government, these documents appear to belong to someone who works for the Indian Embassy. This person (or persons) appear to be involved in trade and diplomatic affairs within the Indian Embassy in Cambodia. The following document (labeled “lost cir page1.jpg) shows an Indian Embassy’s circular about lost passports by Indian citizens.

Other documents appeared to be diplomatic information exchanged between India and Nepal, as well as Belarus and other countries. There are very few documents related to Cambodia, with the exception of a letter sent by the Indian Embassy in Cambodia sent to the Cambodian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation (MFAIC); an invitation to Hun Xen to attend the 2nd Rice Forum during the second week of October 2012; announcements to the Indian government about the visit of various Cambodian officials to India; and request for Indian facilitation for Cambodians who need to perform kidney transplants in India.

If indeed, these documents belong to Indian diplomats, and if Anonymous’ claim is correct, i.e. these documents were stolen from the MFAIC, then the embarrassing question to be raised is: why does the Cambodian MFAIC possess these Indian diplomatic documents?

While most of the documents appear to be dated between February and April 2012, one document (AmbCambodia.pdf), dated 05 September 2012, is authored by Anand Sharma, MP, who recently attended the ASEAN-India meeting in Cambodia. The letter is privately addressed to Dinesh K. Patnaik, the Indian ambassador to Phnom Penh. The question is how did this letter end up in the hand of the Cambodian MFAIC instead. To a curious mind, the first thought would be that these documents could be spirited out of the computer(s) belonging to an Indian diplomat(s) connected to the Indian Embassy in Cambodia. Could it be that Phnom Penh, based on its communist past, still resorts to documents stealing from foreign visitors to Cambodia? Of course, there is a possibility that Anonymous’ claim is inaccurate, but the chance for this is rather slim in view of the presence of the invitation letter sent to Hun Xen.

Another troubling revelations found in the documents hacked are the requests made to the Indian government for safe medical passage of Cambodian citizens to undergo kidney transplants in India. These requests appear to show that there is a possibility of human body parts trafficking in Cambodia, specifically kidneys, as human donor programs do not exist in Cambodia. Therefore, the only possibility left is that these are paid donors, i.e. human part sellers.

These two observations alone are quite troubling to start with, notwithstanding the revelation of the upcoming attendance by Hun Xen to an official function in October of this year.